E-Book Overview
In recent years, senior policy officials have highlighted increased signs of convergence between terrorism and unconventional (CBRN) weapons. Terrorism now involves technologies available to anyone, anywhere, anytime, deployed through innovative solutions. This indicates a new and more complex global security environment with increasing risks of terrorists trying to acquire and deploy a CBRN (Chemical Biological Radiological Nuclear) attack. This book addresses the critical importance of understanding innovation and decision-making between terrorist groups and unconventional weapons, and the difficulty in pinpointing what factors may drive violence escalation. It also underscores the necessity to understand the complex interaction between terrorist group dynamics and decision-making behaviour in relation to old and new technologies. Unconventional Weapons and International Terrorism seeks to identify a set of early warnings and critical indicators for possible future terrorist efforts to acquire and utilize unconventional CBRN weapons as a means to pursue their goals. It also discusses the challenge for intelligence analysis in handling threat convergence in the context of globalisation. The book will be of great interest to students of terrorism studies, counter-terrorism, nuclear proliferation, security studies and IR in general.
E-Book Content
Unconventional Weapons and International Terrorism In recent years, senior policy officials have highlighted increased signs of convergence between terrorism and unconventional (CBRN) weapons. Terrorism now involves technologies available to anyone, anywhere, anytime, deployed through innovative solutions. This indicates a new and more complex global security environment with increasing risks of terrorists trying to acquire and deploy a CBRN (chemical, biological, radiological and nuclear) attack. This book addresses the critical importance of understanding innovation and decision-making between terrorist groups and unconventional weapons, and the difficulty in pinpointing what factors may drive violence escalation. It also underscores the necessity to understand the complex interaction between terrorist group dynamics and decision-making behavior in relation to old and new technologies. Unconventional Weapons and International Terrorism seeks to identify a set of early warnings and critical indicators for possible future terrorist efforts to acquire and utilize unconventional CBRN weapons as a means of pursuing their goals. It also discusses the challenge for intelligence analysis in handling threat convergence in the context of globalization. The book will be of great interest to students of terrorism studies, counter-terrorism, nuclear proliferation, security studies and IR in general. Magnus Ranstorp is Research Director at the Center for Asymmetric Threat Studies at the Swedish National Defence College. Magnus Normark is a Research Analyst at the Division of CBRN Defence and Security at the Swedish Defence Research Agency. Series: Political Violence Series Editors: Paul Wilkinson and David Rapoport This book series contains sober, thoughtful and authoritative academic accounts of terrorism and political violence. Its aim is to produce a useful taxonomy of terror and violence through comparative and historical analysis in both national and international spheres. Each book discusses origins, organizational dynamics and outcomes of particular forms and expressions of political violence. Aviation Terrorism and Security Edited by Paul Wilkinson and Brian M. Jenkins Counter-Terrorist Law and Emergency Powers in the United Kingdom, 1922–2000 Laura K. Donohue The Democratic Experience and Political Violence Edited by David C. Rapoport and Leonard Weinberg Inside Terrorist Organizations Edited by David C. Rapoport The Future of Terrorism Edited by Max Taylor and Joh